Just wondering if you have a part you want to do a one off say an fe intake could you take it to a 3d print company and have it copied, a company that does metal

What kind of price would one intake cost to get copied

The problem you run into with FE and MEL intakes is platform size.  Most 3D printing machines (especially metal) don't have a large enough platform to produce a FE intake.  I had a plastic model of my MEL intake made up first so I could check fit, flow, etc before committing to tooling up the mold.  Even plastic 3D printers (which are nearly as common as refrigerators these days), don't typically have a large enough platform to handle a Ford V8 intake.  It was actually cheaper ($1200 still) to CNC machine the MEL intake out of blocks of nylon and glue them together, then to 3D print it as one piece.  See image below of the plastic intake.

Cost is very subjective.  I am an engineer by trade, and have a Unigraphics (NX) license at home.  That alone costs me nearly $2K a year.  There are cheaper CAD programs out there, but there are significant advantages to a proper industry standard CAD program such as UG NX, Solidworks, PTC/Creo, etc. Most contract engineers will charge you $150 to $250 per hour to scan and generate FUNCTIONAL 3D models (raw casting, final machined part, and engineering drawings). I would expect 5 to 10 billable hours by time that is done. 

3D printed mold for a single intake is going to run you $1500, give or take a few hundred.  The first one is generally much more expensive as you will also have to pay for the mold design and flow modeling.  After that, it is just printer time. 

Jay pretty well layed out the foundry costs.

Then you have final machining.  Could be any where from a few hundred bucks to another $3K depending on time, fixtures needed, etc. 

Add in a few shipping charges and other misc expenses, and $10K is not unreasonable if you pay others to do all the work.

I had a couple of MEL to 6-71 blower intakes cast last year.  We used 3D printed sand molds.  I can't give you a price comparison to lost foam as I was unable to get a viable quote for that process.

I am happy with the surface finish.  See the Images of the raw casting and then machined casting below.  If someone was so enthused, it would polish up just fine. 

I made sure there was plenty of extra material (at least a 1/4" in most cases) on the surfaces that would be machined as I was not confident in the foundry's ability to hold dimensional tolerances, so I made sure there was plenty of material to clean up in case it came out of the mold a bit wonky or warped.  That did not happen, the dimensional stability was excellent, so credit to the mold designer.  The mold also flowed well, as I did not uncover any areas with porosity during machining.







Fit up on my crusty 430 core.

I used FatMat XXX throughout my '62 Monterey Wagon.  Couldn't afford DynaMat for that much square footage.

CleanDan is spot on.  Wind Noise is definitely a very large part of the equation.

On shock tower cars, bolts make it easy to pull the heads with the engine in the car should you need to do that down the road.

Or even on Pickups that have heater core boxes on one side and master cylinder and brake boosters on the other.  Studs normally make pulling the engine the default option.

Too Cool!

Interesting.  Those PW heads sure seem to be a close match.  I might have to put a little brake fluid on the paint and see if there is a logo beneath...

I would love to see some engineering drawings or section cuts of the cylinder heads.  "Pre-Chamber" makes me think of IDI diesels and the Riccardo style combustion chamber, which obviously was fairly effective and millions were built.  I am not sure if this engine uses a similar setup, or something completely different.